The present invention relates to a mixing apparatus and more particularly to an apparatus suited to mix fluids such as liquids, gases or fluidized suspensions.
A common device for mixing fluids includes beater structures such as the conventional household mixer which uses a mechanical device to physically agitate the fluid combination.
Similar in concept to the mechanical beater, a second version of the physical mixing device uses physical agitation imposed by the injection of a non-interacting substance into a container holding the combination of reagents. The non-interacting substance is injected in a manner to create physical turbulence within the container thereby mixing the reagents. Examples of such prior art devices are shown in U.S. Pat. Nos. 3,047,275 and 4,019,720.
A second type of mixing device causes mixing by intersecting the flows of the various reagents. The reagents mix as a result of the turbulence achieved by the interaction of the respective flows. Examples of these devices are shown in U.S. Pat. Nos. 981,098 and 3,826,907.
The present invention is directed to an improvement of the intersecting flow type device or specifically to the type of device which uses opposed flows.
The prior art devices which use opposed reagent flows employ reagent injection structures which direct the reagents into a mixing chamber in a tangential direction, nearly ninety degrees (90.degree.) to a radial line to the injector opening. In these devices the reagent flows intersect the chamber wall to divert circumferentially the reagent around the chamber.
This tangential injection results in the reagent located towards the outer rim of the chamber to be moving rapidly, and the reagent located towards the center of the chamber to be moving more slowly, resulting in a central "dead region" and significant viscous energy dissipate (frictional losses) near the walls.
The existence of the dead region and frictional losses retards the ability of the reagent to thoroughly mix and reduces the amount of swirl energy available for mixing and/or atomization, thereby reducing the overall volume efficiency of the mixing device.
Mixing chambers are frequently used as chemical reaction chambers because of the high degree of physical contact between the reagents. The common form of chemical reaction is the oxidation of a fluid such as in a combustion chamber. In such a chamber the existence of a dead region and incomplete mixing results in "hot spots" which cause the formation of noxious pollutants. Further, chemical reactions against or at the outer chamber walls are also undesirable due to boundary effects.